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Your working life · 9 steps
When you're sick or injured, paperwork is the last thing on your mind, yet everything is decided in the first hours: telling your employer, sending your sick note, getting a workplace accident reported. Done on time, part of your pay is kept and your treatment is covered. Here is the order, for an illness as for an accident.
Illness: tell them by any means as soon as you know you can't work; unless your collective agreement sets a deadline, the custom is to do so within 48 hours. An accident at work or on your commute: tell your employer the same day, within 24 hours at the latest, with the time, place, circumstances and witnesses; if you can't do it on the spot, write to them by recorded delivery.
Any doctor can sign you off, not only your regular GP. Since 1 September 2026, a first paid sick note is limited to 31 days unless justified, and to 3 days in a video consultation, unless it comes from your regular GP or your designated midwife. After an accident, a doctor of your choice writes the initial medical certificate describing your injuries.
Parts 1 and 2 go to your CPAM (or MSA), often sent online by the doctor; part 3 goes to your employer, to each of them if you have several. A paper note is only accepted on the secure form: photocopies and scans are refused. Keep proof that you sent part 3.
Your employer must give you the accident form: show it to every health professional to be treated without paying upfront. They must also report the accident to your fund within 48 hours, not counting Sundays and public holidays, even if they doubt it is work-related. If they don't, you can report it yourself within 2 years.
Do no work at all, not even remotely, unless the doctor agrees. If outings are allowed with set hours, you must be at home from 9am to 11am and 2pm to 4pm, weekends and public holidays included, except for treatment or tests. Staying somewhere else? Give that address on the note. The fund can check without warning, and so can your employer, through a check visit, if they pay you a top-up.
Daily benefit is paid every 14 days, with a statement each time; check your employer's top-up on your payslip, which depends on your length of service or your collective agreement. For a commuting accident, the top-up only starts after 7 days off. For tax, sickness benefit is declared with your salary (except for a long-term illness), and only half of workplace accident benefit is taxable.
An extension follows the same routine, within 48 hours; since 1 September 2026, each paid extension is limited to 62 days unless justified. For an accident, the fund has 30 days to decide whether it is work-related, 2 more months if it investigates: answer its questionnaire precisely. With no decision in time, the accident is recognised.
A decision by the fund (refusing recognition, suspending benefit) can be challenged before its amicable appeals board (commission de recours amiable) within 2 months, then in court (tribunal judiciaire). If it's your employer who isn't paying what they owe, claim it in writing: the procedure gives the order to follow and the letter.
When you return, your employer must tell you within a month the paid leave you earned during your sick leave. After an accident, benefit runs until the injury heals or stabilises; if there are lasting effects, the fund sets a permanent incapacity rate that entitles you to a pension or a lump sum. If the injury gets worse afterwards, that's a relapse: a certificate from your regular GP, and the fund gives you a new accident form.
Describe your situation: Nego tells you where to start, follows the checked steps of each procedure, does the calculations with the site's tools and drafts your letters. It does not replace the administration: each procedure is completed on the official service.
48 hours, for both: parts 1 and 2 to your CPAM (or MSA), part 3 to your employer. If the doctor sent the note online, only part 3 is left for you. The same deadline applies to each extension.
Social Security pays daily benefit from the 4th day off, if you meet the hours-worked or contributions conditions. With at least 1 year's service, your employer tops it up from the 8th day, for a period that depends on your length of service; your collective agreement may do better, up to your full salary.
It depends on what the doctor ticked: no outings, outings allowed with compulsory presence at home from 9am to 11am and 2pm to 4pm every day, or free outings, which the doctor must justify. With free outings, tell your employer when a check visit is possible.
A workplace accident happens during or because of work; a commuting accident, between your home (or usual lunch place) and work. The steps are the same and Social Security pays out the same way, but a commuting accident does not give the protection against dismissal that comes with workplace accidents, and your employer's top-up only starts after 7 days off.
They must report it whatever they think: if they have doubts, all they can do is raise reasoned reservations. If they report nothing, report the accident yourself to your CPAM (or MSA) within 2 years; failing to report exposes them to a fine.
Yes for illness: the benefit and your employer's top-up are declared with your salary, except for a long-term illness. For a workplace accident, only half is taxable. Maternity and paternity benefit are taxable too.
Every rule mentioned here is explained and sourced in its procedure or guide; amounts are calculated by the site's tools. All procedures